During the Rain
by Cerulean Grace
Summary: Meliodas swears this version of Elizabeth will be his last. A look at the relationship between Meliodas and Liz, art done by Mercurialvoid.


Hello! This one is a bit random to me. I started doing a challenge of randomly assigned ships, and I wrote this prompt, but it didn't end up being what I wanted for the challenge at all. So I figured I'd just post it as a oneshot and start over with something else. I don't ship Meliz myself, and mainly just published this for my friend who enjoyed it and said there should be more published content for them! Definitely not my favorite work, but I hope it contributes to those who like the ship! Thanks for reading, thoughts/feedback massively appreciated. The amazing cover art is with permission from my wonderful friend Abel/Mercurialvoid (check them out on tumblr)!

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" _So I'm sorry to my unknown lover,_

 _Sorry that I can't believe,_

 _That anybody else ever really_

 _Starts to fall in love with me."_

He'd never enjoyed sunsets nor sunrises. His original home was slathered in the eternal nothingness of the night, the dark, the void. The sun had meant leaving his home, and leaving home had meant war. Though he'd rather enjoyed war primarily, the desire for it had left him. Before he could begin to enjoy the sun, she'd already been gone. Then the sun had been the cruel reminder of time passing, and so much time had passed.

Nonetheless, he brought her to the frost tipped grasses on the peak of the cliffside he'd acquainted himself with on these casually passing days, brushing off her diluted venom of not trusting him so late in the evening. The minutes passed in the silence she preferred. She watched the sun dip underneath the precipice in its slow descent, and he watched the way her skin radiated beneath each of its deepening colors.

Her eyes flitted to him, pink eyebrows raising. She always had a suspicion in the purse of her lips and the clench of her fists.

He despised the world that made her search for the ugliness in him. He wondered if one day she'd find it, like she had so many centuries ago. Would she love him the same as she had then?

In chilling air he counted the goosebumps on her arms and memorized the purse of her lips, the curve of her brow and the wave of her hair, the line of her neck where it ended.

When she prodded to his purpose in bringing her here, he'd told her this brief moment of sun _was_ her.

And it had been. Blues meeting pinks, the cool chill stilling only for a minor warmth. Beautiful and under appreciated.

He told her this, and she gritted her teeth. But beneath the pink hues of the dying rays of light, her cheeks brightened, and for the first time in _this_ lifetime, she cracked. For the first time, to his belief, she may have felt loved. He wanted her to; he hoped she did.

He told her all about the sunset and it's beauty and her and her beauty.

Bright and colorful and beautiful.

He didn't tell her about the other aspects of sunsets which were comparable to her.

Followed by a darkness that swallowed his thoughts.

Quick. Setting. Brief.

She had insisted that her sheltering with him was due to necessity. A slave had no home, and he offered his, and that was the end of that.

And yet there was comfort here now, in the restful way she slept, the chair she had claimed as her favorite. Her uniforms on the drying line under the autumn day, her shoes placed in a neat row by the door, a teacup she preferred neatly dried next to the sink. A bird that favored her more than him as it dozed on her shoulder.

A sword leaning precariously against his own.

Each morning there was toasted bread and them at the table, a mission each day where she no longer feared her back being exposed, a new ounce of trust for a comrade. An afternoon in the marketplace joking about trinkets, an evening of his failed cooking and her wild success in it, and eventual tea. A reluctant smile less reluctant. Less chill, more warmth, a brightness in her eye.

He didn't know which day had been the transition from reluctant trust to absolute, from a few chosen words to all of them. He didn't know which day she had stolen his pillow, smiled more easily, began to breathe in content.

When had she begun waking up beside him? When had that unspoken fire that went from hateful to passionate.

When had her clothes began to intermingle with his in his own closet? When had she began laying against his chest at night and whispering the dreams she'd stopped dreaming so many years before?

When had he fallen in love all over again?

She was the one that would last, he swore it. The first in centuries to meet him early, to be found at an age worth saving, to survive this long. The first to love him back before the end. Liz, who was walking down the road with a growing-confident smile to each familiar villager (smiles were new: trust was new) paces ahead of him. Liz, with feminine curve and war-trained muscles. With sunset pink locks and daytime sky eyes, with one hundred small scars sprinkling her skin that he's memorized each shape of. Liz would survive, of this much he was sure.

For the first time in a very long time, he lived. With each passing day of their love, he thrived. Danafor would be his final home, so he put down his roots. Their home was already _their_ home. They had their own space, their own routines, their own duties. But their lives interwove still and expanded further. Soon, they had mutual friends whom they actually trusted. They had long nights with too many drinks and their swords cast aside by the river's edge, not worried about an enemy they were sure would never arrive. Here was home, and home was safe and eternal. So was love.

And as he quickened his pace so he could slip an arm over her shoulders through tousled pink hair, he felt the love over and over again. In each breath and heartbeat, inflating each time her eyes met his. She threw him the special smile, full of teasing and smirking. Layers underneath, there was love. A love deep and for him alone.

And that was home.

In the morning it was warm, and pink strands tickled his bare chest. This was the same as every morning. It was tangled blankets and murmuring sighs, body heat and giggling. This was as close to heaven that his cursed eternity would get, and somehow, he thought it was better still.

And much like all mornings, he fastened a sword around his hips and straightened the crest among his chest; the smell of toast and tea already in the air. Thank god she knew how to cook, _amazingly_. She was the perfect balance to him. Serious at the correct times where he fell to jokes, pushing to go forward when he wanted to turn back, cautious and private when he threw his whims to the wind.

Wandle mused his usual chatter, a peaceful background noise to the morning. Before they exited the door together, lips brushed his cheek. She always kissed him softly before leaving the home - it was almost a silent promise to do so again, tomorrow morning and the next. And then again after, and again forever.

Each time her lips pressed his cheek, he turned his faces to hers to close the distance. Each morning she'd pretend to be shocked in her secret delight.

And that was morning. Breakfast and tea and the noise she made when they kissed that he played on repeat in his mind through the day.

He took her again to the sunset on the precipice of a hill, now coated in meadows and warmth. Her eyes were less stone now, liquid gems that took in the flowers. He watched her sit among the petals and breathe the longest breath, a sigh.

"If I never met you, I'd never be able to feel so happy spending ordinary, peaceful days like this."

She was right, she was always right. The sun was setting and it was warm and pink and blue; peaceful and ordinary by the day and still so very her. The sky was her, the sunset was her, home was her. It was all her, forever.

She looked as beautiful in the dimming light as she had when he first met her, stone cold and untrusting. At night he dreamed of her sprawled on the flowers whispering about her happiness with him. He loved that dream.

This morning is dreary and clouded, but it's _their_ morning nonetheless. Morning is the scent of her hair in his nose, her fluttering eyelids on his chest. Its Wandle's chatter and Liz's laughter, the apron tied around her waist as she checks the stovetop. It's her jokingly threatening him with the ladle when he runs his hands along her. It's the soft sigh that escapes her when her teacup presses against her lips, the stream turning her cheeks to roses. It's them each grabbing their swords from their place against the wall.

It's her lips against his cheek in the doorway, his lips against hers, and the noise her smile brings that runs through his mind.

But today is different than the other days.

He doesn't know when she's separated, and with the chaos ensuing he barely has time to keep himself in check. Today is one enemy, and then another. Demons? They should hardly exist anymore. It's too many thoughts and worries through his mind all at once: conspiracies, paranoias, deepest fears. When did he get so stupid as to lose her? Why was she always running off in some brave stupor. Her trust in him was full, but her trust in herself to protect others was an unwavering force that not even he could interfere with. He wishes he could demand her selfishness, but he knows better.

It's raining. It's cold. It's about the time of sunset, his mind absently notes, but he can't see the sun. There is no pink and blue; only gray.

When he finds her, she's barely there. He doesn't think of anything, because his mind and body cease their ability to function.

He hears the words she whispers in reassurance as she bleeds out, but doesn't truly process them. His vision is too busy going black as he focuses on her eyes. Not Liz's eyes, untrusting and then forever trusting, cold as ice and then soft and warm. These are her eyes, but they go farther back; these are eyes as old as him, ones he's seen over one hundred times for mere moments at the very end.

But this can't be the end, because this morning he had woken up with her pressed against his chest. This morning they had kissed in the doorway and promised to do it tomorrow and forever. She had said she wanted the ordinary, peaceful days. So this wasn't the end. In a moment, the clouds would part and there would be a sunset and she'd be clean of her blood and they'd go home.

But it was dark, and there was no sunset, and _he_ was dark.

And somewhere, amidst his destruction and his minds only thought of "this isn't the end", a baby was sobbing.

It wasn't the end. Of course it wasn't the end. But this time, with her, he truly wished it was.


End file.
